Possession by Costume
by writer writing
Summary: It's Halloween and Clark has to save the people at a Halloween club from becoming permanently possessed by their costumes.
1. Chapter 1

Clark was a little afraid when he saw Lois holding a gigantic carving knife. She brought it crashing down into the pumpkin and vigorously began taking off the top.

"Wouldn't you be more comfortable with a butter knife?" he suggested.

"Give me a break. I've been carving pumpkins since I was 7."

"Yeah right. What kind of parent in their right mind would let their child carve with one of those?"

"Apparently a 3 star general."

"You're making me nervous. Let me carve."

"You had your chance, Smallville. It's Halloween and no Jack-o-lantern on the Kent property. I had to go out to your pumpkin patch and pick it. The vine pricked my fingers I might add. I deserve to do the fun part of this."

"Just be careful," he said, and he turned around to wash his hands in the kitchen sink.

Lois pulled out a handful of slimy pumpkin guts and seeds. Before Clark knew what was happening, she had pulled the back of his shirt open and dropped it down his back.

He didn't get angry but proceeded to shake it out of his shirt. "I should have seen that coming," he said.

"Did it make you sticky?" she asked with a grin.

"Yes. Thanks to you, I'm going to have to take a shower before I go to bed."

"What are you doing for Halloween? Your mom is gone away on business and you have the house to yourself," Lois said, as she finished cleaning out the pumpkin.

"Nothing really. I'm going to watch a Twilight Zone marathon."

"Are you serious? The Twilight Zone is not scary. It's creepy at best. You have to be afraid to fall asleep on Halloween or it's not good enough."

"I like to sleep."

Lois had picked up the knife again and was expertly carving out a face. "Whimp."

"What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to a new club in Metropolis. I thought about staying in Smallville, but as much as I like a good scare, I didn't want to deal with real witches, vampires, and ghosts. I get enough of that when it's not Halloween."

"What new club?"

"It's called the Halloween Club. You have to dress in a costume. Tonight is the first night it's open, but it'll be open year round. It might be pretty good or it might be corny. I don't know yet."

"What are you going to dress up as?"

"Maid Marion. I wasn't going to buy another costume so close together just because I wore it to Lex's charity ball."

"I assume that means you're going with Oliver Queen?"

"He is my boyfriend. You want to know a secret? It's not really a Maid Marion costume. I saw it in a catalogue, and it's really a Juliet costume. I wonder if Oliver knew that when he bought it?"

"That's kind of funny if you think about it. On the surface you two look like the perfect couple, but you're mismatched."

"Are you trying to imply something? Ollie and I are a perfect couple. What do you think of my Jack-o-lantern? Scary?"

"It's pretty good." He studied it for a few seconds. "Is that supposed to be Lex?"

"You noticed. I'm a pumpkin artist. Isn't it great? Can you think of anything scarier than our favorite bald billionaire?"

"What if other people see that and know who it is?"

"I'm counting on it. Do you have a flashlight I can put in it? I would use a candle but the house would probably burn down, and it's been repaired and rebuilt too much as it is."

Clark pulled a flashlight out of the drawer and gave it to her. She put it in and admired it. Then she gave it to Clark and told him to put it on the porch as she started to head toward the stairs.

"Where are you going?"

"I'm getting ready to go. I'll have to drive straight to Metropolis from here, so I brought my costume to change in to."

When she came downstairs, she saw Clark sitting on the couch and watching his marathon. The episode appeared to have an alien in it, who was about to be dissected. He was so absorbed by it that he didn't hear her sneak up behind him. "Boo!" she shouted, as she grabbed him by his arm. He jumped up and turned around with terror on his face until he saw who it was.

Lois was laughing hard. "Boy, I wish you could have seen your face. Forget what I said earlier. Twilight Zone is just right for you. Happy Halloween, Clark," she said as she went out the door.

Clark sat back down, muttering under his breath.


	2. Chapter 2

Lois and Oliver were at the bar of the Halloween Club. Lois swished the puce colored liquid around in her glass and then forced herself to take a drink.

"How is it?" Oliver asked.

"About how it looks. It had such a promising name. Biting Goblins. It's hard to say what's in it. Maybe milk, lime juice, and a little beer. I should have watched what they put in it."

"Did you want to trade me for my Bloody Mary?"

"No, thanks. No reason for us both to suffer because I chose to try something new."

"We don't have to drink. We can dance."

"To the Addams Family theme song?"

"It's a great song. Watch how easy it is to dance to," he started bobbing up and down and snapping his fingers.

"No, thank you. The whole place is lame. I guess we can just sit here and laugh at people's costumes. Look at that girl dressed like a rabbit."

"I'm looking," he said day dreamily.

She jabbed him in the ribs with her elbow.

"You told me to. Hey, is that Lex and his girlfriend?"

"So it is. I wonder who they're supposed to be dressed up as."

"It looks like Bonnie and Clyde to me."

"I see that now. Hopefully those aren't real guns."

"You don't trust them? Do you think they're bad people?"

"I know Lex is but not in a gun-slinging, bank-robbing kind of way. He's too smart and wealthy to get caught, at least not easily. Lana is more complicated."

"What do you mean?"

"This may sound a little strange, but I think Lana assumes the personality of whoever she's dating at the time. When she was with that Jason guy, she was cultured and mysterious. When she was with Clark, she was a small town orphan with the innocent, woe-is-me act. Chloe said when she was with Whitney, she was popular and one-dimensional. Now that she's with Lex, she's taking on a darker side. That's why she can't seem to go 5 minutes without having a boyfriend or she'll lose her entire identity."

"I don't know her well enough to make that judgment. Did you want to go say hi to them?"

"No need. They've spotted us and are coming in for the attack."

"Oliver, Lois! How nice to see you here and in the same costumes," Lana said in an overly sweet voice.

Lois and Oliver nodded and tried to look disinterested, hoping they would take a hint and socialize elsewhere.

"I expected a better class of people to show up," Lex said, glancing around.

"So did I," Lois said, staring pointedly at Lex and Lana.

Lex's eyes narrowed, and he glared at her. "Have you ever heard the theory that a costume is a hidden facet of our personality?"

Lois smirked. "No, but that would certainly make sense, Clyde."

"That would mean Oliver likes arrows and living like an outlaw," Lana said, "and Lois is a damsel-in-distress, waiting to be saved by her hero."

"Honey," Lex said, "you're being too kind to Lois. I would say she's more like a tramp hot for a criminal. She thinks she's gone up in the world from muffin peddler to writing for a rag, but everyone knows it is really a step down."

Lois was ready to start the first bar brawl of the night if Oliver hadn't placed a reassuring hand on her shoulder. Lex and Lana left, seeing they had properly riled Lois.

"Why don't we dance? It'll take our mind off of them," Oliver said.

"I don't think Monster Mash is any easier to dance to than the Addams Family but why not?"

sss

The man sitting in the back room of the Halloween club was your stereotypical mad scientist, and it wasn't a costume. He squinted at the screen in front of him through his thick glasses and ran his hand through his wild, white hair. He tugged at the sleeves of his lab coat as he watched the people at the club. He hadn't expected so many people to show up or so many good costumes. This was better than he had imagined. Until a couple of months ago, he had worked as a chemistry professor. He had begun to research the supernatural, for ways to tie it into chemistry. The Ivy League college he worked for couldn't tolerate a nutty professor, so they had found an excuse to fire him after all his years of dedication. That didn't matter now. He would show them. He had had a breakthrough in his research. He was able to take the spiritual essence of a being, fictional or not, and bring that essence into a person wearing a physical representation or in other words, a costume. There was a lot of boring scientific reasoning behind the process that involved a chemical of his own creation, but that wasn't important. What was important was that his experiment was about to be set into motion.

His assistant and body bouncer for the night called him on the walkie talkie.

"It's all done, boss. I've turned the crowd outside away. I think I picked out some interesting costumes."

"Good job."

He pushed the button that released the chemical into the air. If all went well, the opportunities were limitless, but for now he was going to sit back, observe his work, and take notes.


	3. Chapter 3

Clark shivered. The man on Twilight Zone had just been killed by a doll. If he were a little girl, he would never touch his dolls again.

The doorbell rang. That meant more trick-or-treaters. He picked up the candy bowl and opened the door. There was a girl in a witch costume with her little brother, who was dressed like a fireman. They were familiar looking, most people in Smallville were, but he didn't know their names. He dropped a Snickers bar in their bags. The little girl took them back out.

"I don't like nuts," she said, "and neither does Jake."

I'm sorry, but that's all we have left," he told her.

"Your mom is the senator. She's supposed to give out the best treats. Mom said so."

"You should've come earlier in the night, and then there would've been more selection."

"Fine, but when I tell my mommy, she won't ever vote for Mrs. Kent," she said, pointing to the waiting jeep in the driveway.

Clark sighed. He couldn't cause his mom to lose votes, in case she decided to run again. "Let me see what we have in the kitchen." As he looked around, it didn't look promising. There was some leftover broccoli casserole. As far as sweets went, there was a can of pumpkin pie filling to use come Thanksgiving. The kids had followed him in. She picked up his caramel apple off the cabinet. The box had originally contained 4 but when Lois was over here, she had eaten 3 of them. However, she had been nice enough to make a point of saving him one.

"It's got nuts on it," Clark told her.

"That's okay. I like it when it's on a caramel apple. What do you want, Jake?"

"I like Snickers, Lizzy."

"No, you don't."

"Yes, I do. Just because you're bigger than me, doesn't mean you can tell me what I like."

Clark dumped the rest of the candy in the bowl in the boy's bag and ushered them out the door.

The girl stopped to take a look at Lois' pumpkin. "Is that supposed to be the big head on Wizard of Oz because it doesn't look like it."

"You better get back to your car. Your mom is probably tired of waiting."

He shut the door. He was getting tired of the marathon, and he didn't like watching it by himself. He didn't have anything for the trick-or-treaters now. He wondered what Lois was doing. Probably having a great time with Oliver. He wondered if she would mind terribly if he joined them. He knew she would, but it's not like she never did anything that he didn't like. Normally, he would've chosen to spend time with Chloe, but she was watching scary movies with Jimmy and he didn't feel right imposing on their date. He supposed he would be imposing on Lois and Oliver's date, but that didn't seem to bother him for some reason. While he was out, he could stop by the store and get some caramel apples.

He didn't waste time with using a vehicle. He ran to Metropolis. It was strange that no one was waiting outside the club. There was a scary-looking bouncer in front of the door.

"Hello, sir. Can I go in?"

"The club is full. If tonight goes well, we'll be open tomorrow night. Besides, you don't even have a costume."

Clark looked down at his plaid shirt and jeans. "I'm a farmer."

"A farmer?"

"Yeah. Uh…old McDonald."

"I've seen people dressed like Ronald McDonald before but never old McDonald. Maybe I'll let you in tomorrow but might I suggest a hat and overalls? Maybe you could even find a piece of hay to chew on."

"My friends are in there."

"Tomorrow."

Clark started walking away. He almost kicked a piece of gravel into space before he caught himself. He was really disappointed. Tonight just wasn't his night. Before he went back to Smallville though, he wanted to take a look and see what was going on inside with his x-ray vision. He wasn't prepared for what he saw. He had been prepared to see people in costumes but not acting out the parts. The people dressed like animals were hopping and crawling around on the floor. He couldn't believe it when he saw Lex and Lana breaking into the cash register. Oliver was aiming to put an arrow through a beer bottle, but where was Lois? He spotted her, and it caused his heart to leap up into his throat. She was off in a corner by herself, and she was about to plunge a knife through her heart.


	4. Chapter 4

Clark super sped pass the bouncer. The bouncer got a confused look as he wondered where the young man had gone and for a second, he thought the door opened behind him, but he chalked it up to his imagination.

Clark reached her and pulled the knife out of her hands just in time. It had been millimeters away from her chest.

"What in the world were you trying to do?" Clark asked her in a voice mixed with anger and concern.

She let out a miserable sigh. "Trying to kill mineself."

"I know that but why?"

"I lost mine one true love."

"Oliver? You were ready to commit suicide because your boyfriend dumped you? That doesn't sound like you!"

"Who art thou speaking of? I know Oliver not. I speak of Romeo."

"I get it. This is a sick Halloween joke of yours. It's not funny."

She didn't answer him but looked up at him in a confused manner. Clark looked back at Oliver. He was going through beer after beer. His pockets were bulging with money that hadn't been there before. Apparently Oliver was being Robin Hood and stealing from the rich and later would be giving to the poor. During this length of time, Lois had slipped the knife out of his hand and was about to run it through her heart again. He grabbed it back and this time he crushed the blade and threw it away, behind his back of course.

"Listen, Lois—"

"Juliet."

"Fine. Listen, Juliet. I don't know what's going on with everybody in here, but I'm going to find out. Meanwhile, I would appreciate it if you wouldn't kill yourself."

"I cannot live without Romeo. I feigned mine death earlier, so that I wouldst not have to marry Paris. When I awoke, I was in this room and yonder man that calleth himself a bartender told me Romeo hath killed himself with poison, and he let me borrow a knife."

"Do you know what Romeo looks like?"

"He hath the most handsome face in the world."

"What's the color of his hair and eyes?"

"Heaven help me! I cannot recall his face."

"Dost thou not recognize thine Romeo?" Clark asked in hopes that she would fall for it and stop trying to kill herself.

"Romeo? Why art thou dressed strangely?"

"It's a disguise."

She hugged and then kissed him. He had to admit that it wasn't the worst feeling in the world. He couldn't enjoy it though, knowing what the real Lois would think about kissing him.

"Stay here, Lo—Juliet. I have to figure some things out."

"Thou hast found a strange way of speaking. I will come with thee." She further emphasized her point by wrapping her arm around his waist.

If it were Lois and not a possessed Lois, he might not be so worried about it. He didn't know what they were up against, but he didn't think Juliet was a black belt like Lois, should there be violence. What could he do though? He didn't want to leave her alone with her suicidal tendencies. He still couldn't believe that she thought he was Romeo, but Juliet was supposedly a 13 year old girl and during those times they were fairly childish and uneducated anyway. This was the time period when accusing someone of being a witch made them so. They weren't hard to fool.

He looked around the room. What was the matter with these people? They couldn't have all gone crazy at the same time. It might've been something in their drinks. He didn't want to get the bartender's attention yet because it seemed he was in on it, so he x-rayed from afar. The drinks looked perfectly normal. He found it hard to concentrate and plan on what to do next with "Juliet" kissing his neck. He heard the door open and close. Lana and Lex had just left with a bunch of cash, Bonnie and Clyde might've been more accurate. He saw someone dressed like a royal guard or something. He told the guy to guard her for a second, and he took off.

Apparently the outdoor bouncer had protested to them leaving because he had been knocked unconscious. Lex and Lana had called a taxi, knocked the taxi driver out, and were preparing to speed off. Clark held onto the taxi until they abandoned it, thinking it was broken down. He grabbed them and took them back inside the club. He locked them up in the club's small, windowless bathroom. Lois ran to him and reaffirmed her position by his side. He noticed the door in the back and saw the man with his screen and notebook. There's where the answers were.


	5. Chapter 5

The old man was not surprised by their entrance because of the screen. Clark took the notebook from him and skimmed it.

"I'm sure the police will be interested in seeing this."

"You could turn me in, but I don't think you will."

"Watch me."

"No, watch this."

He brought Clark onto the screen from earlier. It showed him super speeding to Lois and crushing the knife. Clark was surprised when he didn't feel Lois' arm around him anymore. She started backing away from him.

"What's the matter?" he asked her, as if he didn't know.

"Thou hast magic. Thou sold thy soul to the devil."

"It's not magic."

"Then how canst thou perform thy feats and have it be on a moving picture?"

"It's hard to explain, Lois. I'll tell you later."

"I think thou art not my husband after all. Thou canst not even say mine name. Thou art a demon from hell."

He was a little hurt by her fearful reaction but reminded himself that it wasn't really Lois. "I have to care of this situation. Please, just don't leave the room."

She stopped reaching for the door and fell back against the wall. She didn't want to make somebody with magical powers angry.

"What makes you think that something won't happen to the tape?" Clark asked.

"You could destroy the tape, but I'll still know what I saw, and I'm sure someone will believe me."

"I don't care what you tell or show everyone. Those people out there have to be returned to normal."

"Or what?"

"I'll still call the police, and you'll be arrested for your experiment."

"I'll make a deal with you. You don't put me in prison, and I'll give you the chemical that can cancel out the other's effect. You better make your decision fast because once it's been in their system for a few hours, their condition cannot be reversed."

Clark didn't like the deal, but people's lives were in danger. He could figure out how to deal with the mad scientist later.

"Fine. Now where's the cure?"

"In the Arctic."

"I can get there in time. What does it look like?"

He told Clark where and what it was. Clark was back almost instantly. He took Lois into the room with everyone else and released the stuff all around the club. It made everyone pass out for a few minutes and during that time, the bouncer and bartender went to jail, and he still kept his promise by putting the chemist into a mental institution. He waited by Lois' side until she woke up. At last she sat up and looked around.

"Where am I?" she asked. "Wait, I remember that. What are you doing here, Smallville?"

"You don't remember what happened?" he asked in a relieved voice.

"No."

"You know what they say. Weird things happen on all Hallow's Eve. You wouldn't believe it if I told you anyway."

"That doesn't mean I don't want to hear about it."

"How about I give you an exclusive tomorrow, and everybody can read about what happened in the paper." 'Or most of what happened anyhow,' he added in his head.

"Okay. I guess I'll agree to that. Where's Ollie?" she asked, looking through the sea of confused people.

"There you are, Lois," Oliver said, "I have some business to take care of. I'll see you tomorrow."

"See you tomorrow then," she replied.

"Lois, can I ride home with you?" Clark asked. "I didn't bring my car."

"What did you do? Walk here?"

"I took a taxi."

It might've been stupid to tell her he didn't take his truck, but he wanted to ride with her. He needed her to make him laugh and show that she wasn't afraid of him.

"Let's go. You can give me all the details on the way home and by the way, did you know that you didn't even dress up to come here, Clark. I must admit, however, that plaid has its own kind of scariness."

"It's good I didn't dress up, and I'm definitely going as Clark Kent next year."

"How creative and what a coincidence! I was planning on going as Lois Lane next year. We could go together," she said in her teasing tone.

Everyone left the club. It's too bad that no one saw the werewolf, who had left the building and thereby escaped the treatment. He left to bring terror to Metropolis. Perhaps though that wasn't quite as scary as the level of anger Lex and Lana were going to feel when someone let them out of the bathroom.

The End

Happy Halloween!


End file.
